


Spoilt for Choice

by Fides



Series: Watcherverse: Horsemen [1]
Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: Dubious Consent, F/M, Horseman Era, M/M, Merry Month of Masturbation Challenge, Slavery, Violence, mmom, mmom 2010, mmom 2010: day 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-03
Updated: 2010-05-03
Packaged: 2017-10-09 06:59:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/84297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fides/pseuds/Fides
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kronos notices Methos' growing dissatisfaction and presents him with the one thing he knows will keep his brother's attention - a challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spoilt for Choice

"Methos!"

Methos looked across the dunes and ignored his brother. The sands were singing to him, a mournful chant which wouldn't have been out of place in a temple. Sometimes the desert screamed and sometimes it echoed the rumble and clash of the battles that played out upon its surface, but just then it was lifting its voice in praise to absent Gods. Methos had heard some of the slaves whispering that the noise was made by demons and evil sand spirits. Superstitious fools, as if they needed to look elsewhere to find their devils.

"Methos?"

Methos dragged his eyes from the horizon. "Silas?"

Silas chuckled, a deep earthquake of sound, "Already planning our next raid, Brother?".

The sand was the colour of saffron, warm even through the soles of his boots. The horses hated it, but their very presence made their riders legends and confused their enemies. After what had happened with Kronos and the camels... well, whatever else history would remember them as, if it did, it would remember them as horsemen

Making a non-committal gesture, Methos turned and looked past his brother to the bound captives. Kronos wanted him to divide the bounty and he wondered why. Normally they divided the spoils by competitive debate. He was never particularly interested in the slaves but the games thrilled and challenged him. This time, the slaves waited for his decision, as they had since they had been brought to the camp. They looked to be the usual huddle of young women, identical in their fear and grief, a few youths and warriors scattered in for variety or possibly randomness. It was always a little hard to be sure why his brothers roped those they did. He rarely took prisoners himself, it seemed pointless. They were just broken trophies and unlike Caspian he felt no need for such things.

These at least were relics of a good fight. The anger that had boiled inside him had been appeased for the time being. Methos didn't know what caused it, some minor frustration with the world that grew inside him until it was ready to rip him, or whoever got in his way, apart. When he rode that anger could scream from him, finding a valid target at last. There were no doubts, no power games, nothing except the clarifying knowledge that he was death personified and he would fight and kill or fight and die just as his opponents would.

For a few hours there was no pretence, just the thrill of being himself and the blessed confusion of battle forcing the best from him. Behind the silver skull no other masks were needed and Methos revelled in that freedom. There was something joyous in that release, as exhilarating as a Quickening in its own way. The feeling of personal power when he had renounced all claim to such in the name of friendship and survival. The feeling that he was alive. It left him, if not exhausted, then calm again.

Because only Death was alive. When he was not Death he was an empty mask that hung on a tent pole, a Brother when convenient and a survivor when not. He knew which he preferred. The white-hot serpent twisted in his gut at the thought of submission or compromise. He ignored it because victory came at the end of the war, not the end of the battle. Those who did not understand that there were many ways to win, doomed themselves never to truly do so.

Methos listened to the war drums of the earth and knew that this was how the world was. It had rules and structures that were beyond even Immortals. The balance of the ruler and the ruled, the master and the slave. If you were a slave you could aspire to become a master. One slip and a master could become a slave. That was the way of the world. Even final death. Anything else and anarchic chaos would prevail. Better to make it as they wished within those bounds, to share the world between the four of them rather than to be shared in their turn.

So they saw to each others needs, his brothers and he, keeping each other in check against the threat of chaos. When Kronos and Caspian chaffed at civilisation he found them new places to conquer. When Silas needed something to nurture, Kronos and he found something to distract Caspain and stop him eating whatever-it-was to gain its strength. And when he needed to do something, needed to hurt and didn't care if it was himself or someone else then Kronos and Silas found some previously overlooked banditry in whose obliteration he could loose himself. No planning, no thought, just the hoof-beat thunder of his heart.

The wind changed fractionally and the desert quietened to the groans of the immediate surroundings. He had put Kronos off for as long as he could, Methos knew, it was time to turn his reluctant thoughts back from the freedom of the desert to the barrier it became. The latest inhabitants of their cage needed attention so he could sleep and dream of galloping across the dunes.

The thought kindled his interest from its dormancy. A raid wasn't truly complete until the spoils had been counted and divided. One raid at a time. One battle at a time. And it was past time to see what his brothers' had dragged home, and why Kronos was so happy when he had not yet taken his share.

Methos patted Silas on the shoulder as he walked passed him. He could sense the heavy presence of the beaming giant at his back. Silent, watchful and ready to follow his lead. It was a comforting feeling. For him, if not for the sorry, huddled mass in front of them. Still, those who he put into Silas' hands would come to thank him. His brother had simple needs which could be met without any but the most accidental fatalities. The majority of the slaves they kept around the camp had started off as Silas'. Others rarely had time to learn what was required of them to survive.

How to divide the spoils? Caspian had his little peculiarities which needed to be taken into account. Kronos was in an odd mood and that tended to mean trouble for someone. Methos looked over the slaves as he thought, categorising them by looks and manner. Catching sight of a particular figure among the many, Methos paused. Slender but with a fighters' sleek muscles. Blond, so rare in this area that there must be a story behind it, and pale skin set aflame by the sun. A dark pattern stood out against the red of his upper arm; a tattoo or brand. Methos looked closer trying to determine which deity the man had chosen to evoke with his body or whether it was a mark of punishment. The pattern told him nothing but the man's presence told him everything.

He had been curious about the warrior when he had spotted him out of the corner of his eye during the fighting. One of his brothers, Kronos most likely, must have noticed and made sure that the man was taken rather than killed. Methos wondered what the price would be for that. Sorting out any disagreements over his choices would be the least of it.

Methos stalked towards the new slaves slowly, noting who watched him and who looked away. The hours in the sun had dried tears and throats but their silence was deafening. He circled them slowly, because he could. Because there was power in starting small. In getting under their skin and into their minds before they realised what they needed to guard against.

"You have been captured in battle which makes you slaves." Start with the obvious, with what they knew and understood. He was so close they could have reached out and touched him but they were as frozen as a mouse before a snake. He let his voice soften, he had to make sure they understood even through the fear. "You have no life now except what we grant you. You have no honour except in obedience. You live to serve us, whether that is cleaning out the dung pile or warming our beds." He could see the effect of his words. The futile kindling of angry denial in a few expressions, the well of despair filling up the rest. Methos firmed his tone, cutting off the objections before they could start. "If you disobey, you will be punished. If you try to escape you will be hamstrung, and anyone who helped you will be beaten to death. If any of you succeed in escaping," Methos paused, letting them feel hope for the last, brief, time, "then you will die in the desert knowing that by your actions you condemned every other slave in this camp to death." He let that thought settle in their minds. There was no escape, there were just two options. "If you serve well you will be rewarded. If you refuse then you die. I give you this one chance to refuse what your Gods chose for you when they gave you to us."

Methos had timed his circuit so that the sun was at his back as he finished. His shadow, elongated to that of a giant, spread over the captives, while the light behind made them squint up at him. It created the effect he was looking for. He could have made his point more quickly and violently but he prided himself on having style, unlike his Brothers. Not that Kronos didn't have a style that was uniquely his own, but one did not apply such trivial mundanities as style to a force of nature.

A shuffle of movement and one of the men, black haired braided in a warriors style but young and foolish, pulled away from restraining hands to draw himself to his feet. Dark, almond eyes flashed in a face matted with dried blood. The bruise, dark even against the dusky skin, that spread from his temple past his hairline explained how he had been taken. The youth would be too much trouble to keep alive, Methos knew it without questioning the instinct. Kronos had either collected him for the fun of breaking him or because he hadn't been sure whether it was the day or the night which had caught his brother's eye. In other circumstances he might have laughed and let this stupidity play out, but there was too much chance that the boy's defiance could infect the others. The result would be the same in the end, but there would be needless blood spilt. His brothers might take pleasure in such things but Methos abhorred waste and unnecessary effort. Clearing up the mess of a rebellion, even if it was only a desertion, was both. It was interesting, though, that it had been the blond who had tried to hold the other man back.

Methos walked forward and bodies parted before him like grass to the wind. The youth was defiant in the face of the violence he expected. Gently Methos reached out to catch the tense jaw and turn the head so the temple wound faced him more clearly. With soft fingers he probed the damage, checking for hidden breaks. The blood was long dried, gritty with sand underneath his touch. Confusion muddied the the sullen expression for a moment as Methos trailed his hand lower, skimming neck and chest. Allowing his hand to fall Methos moved closer until there was only the width of body heat between them. Not touching he walked around the dissenter until he stood directly behind the the warrior and a breath away.

"You can live and be mine." Methos repeated, half coaxing and half mocking. "Mine and my Brothers. Every thing you are. Everything you could be. Ours." Only his breath brushed across defiant skin as he dropped his voice lower. "Our slave. Our whore."

He would break too easily. Methos could see it in the lines of his body and the fanaticism in his baring. It wouldn't even be an interesting type of madness, if any madness could be called interesting. Having lived with Caspian's little eccentricities, Methos couldn't see the attraction and Silas wasn't in need of a new pet. After the first, forced proof of the reality of his new situation had become clear to him even Kronos would find more fun to be had from his own hand - killing him would just save his Brother the frustration of such a worthless toy. The brunette with the fire in her eyes would be much better suited to his Brother's games. She might even come out ahead if Methos had read the intelligent cunning in her face correctly.

"I would rather die. As would any man of honour." The warrior insisted. He didn't mention any of the women huddled near him, Methos noted. It did not surprise him. "Give my brothers and I our swords and we will prove we are no man's slave. Stand by me, those of you with honour and let this bandit understand the strength of our defiance."

It was a sentiment Methos had heard many times before, and frequently more eloquently. Disregarding the words or the few who shuffled together at the speech, Methos locked eyes with his blond. There was an irritation at the other man's words colouring his posture, coupled with the hint of resignation. The man would die with his shield-brother because he had to, but the choice had not been his.

Methos shrugged. It wasn't up to him to convert the uninterested. He could feel the weight of the absent mask against his skin. A quick death was more than the idiot deserved if it cost him the blond, but it would serve to shut him up. Maybe his Gods had more patience with him than Methos did. All it took was one fluid movement and the warrior's blood was drunk greedily by the sand, a sunset swaythe of copper and scarlet.

Methos had not taken his eyes from his chosen slave. It had never been about the dead man at his feet or the blood on his sword. He saw the knowledge of that in the other man's eyes and held his gaze.

"He died knowing you were willing to die with him. Now you have the choice – do you want to live to serve me or die to serve him?"

"I want to live." His desert-tinted choice rasped.

Methos smiled tightly. He had been right – this one was a survivor. Methos did not spare a thought for those not willing to endure. They would be dead by morning. Perhaps not before all there fears had been realised, but they would be dead as he had promised. Why waste the lives of those who wanted to survive when there were those who wanted to die. Methos chivvied them and a few others, including the girl he had thought Kronos would like, towards the watching figures of Kronos and Caspian. He was satisfied with the division, and Kronos and Caspian could either argue out their split or destroy them together.

Even across the camp, Methos could see the delighted smile Kronos often got when watching him fight. If the slaves, and Caspian's games, weren't enough for him, then Methos could expect his brother at his tent before too many hours had passed. What was one more night shared? Kronos had seen Methos' need, even before he himself had, and answered it. To do any less in return suggested weakness. The beast that curled in his belly tightened its coils in objection and Methos dragged his slave forward to his knees, hand clenching into a fist ready to punish the disobedience of objection.

The remaining slaves, nominally his and Silas', shuffled uneasily, probably startled by his action and trying to find comfort in each other while not attracting his attention to themselves. It was fit, so he ignored them – they would get no comfort elsewhere and it reduced the numbers foolish enough to try and escape when they bonded.

Silas rumbled happily and petted the head of one of the slave girls. She froze under the touch, very much the rabbit that Silas had probably confused her with. Methos ran a hand over the coarse hair of his own choice, it crackled unpleasantly under his fingers, sand, blood and dirt matting it into spikes. Sun-bleached eyes glared at him from groin level. Not totally submissive then. That made things more interesting. As he had before, Methos let his fingers slip down to cup the slave's chin, forcing the head up. He could feel the tension vibrating through every muscle of the jaw. Determination rather then fear, but enough horror to make victory sweeter. Methos ran a thumb over the slave's dry lips and watched him blanch under his tan as the the need to fight warred with the necessity of preservation.

He pressed his thumb inwards and the lips parted but the teeth tightened. Methos smiled. He wondered how long he could draw the tension out. Whether he could make the slave crawl to him and beg to be taken just to end the waiting? What stories and information the slave would tell to postpone the inevitable? Maybe there was some enjoyment to be had in having a personal slave after all, beyond the obvious gratification.

Leaving the rest to Silas in the knowledge that he could just borrow some as he usually did, Methos pulled his prize up and lead him towards his tent. They had much to discuss before Kronos came visiting.


End file.
